What I Think About When I Think About Art

Art Bombing

I did my first ever art bomb this weekend! (Look for the white squares in the photos.) I know it’s supposed to be anonymous so I’m debating over how much detail to reveal.

The venue was an art fair and the funnest part for me was walking around looking like your average art fair patron yet surreptitiously posting my art haiku on various surfaces. I’ll bet I don’t look like the art bomber type, but I don’t know what that would be, so I could be wrong about that.

I looked up “art bombing” on Google and found a definition that’s definitely not what I’m talking about: “Photographing the superimposition of real objects or people into a work of art, typically for amusement.” What I mean is what yarn bombers do. They install knitted pieces in public places for the delight of discovering it.

Sometimes that’s called street art, but what if you don’t do it on the street? Anyway, back to the story. I wrote haiku about experiencing art. Thoughts that might go through your mind. Or things that people write about art. Here’s one:

What color is that?
I like the line, over here
It just works for me

People like art for all different reasons; that’s what I wanted to address. But my reason for art bombing was so that people could discover something interesting that wasn’t on the “menu.” I have nothing against the art establishment. I just love the idea of discovering something that not everyone knows about, something that is partly hidden. Something that you might not even see unless you were open to truly seeing what’s around you, and not just the official artwork.